Career
Active in Irish republicanism after getting involved with the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association of the 1960s, he worked as a publican. Murphy was the unsuccessful Sinn Féin candidate for South Down in the 1997 election to the United Kingdom Parliament. A few months later he was elected to Newry and Mourne District Council.
He was then elected from the same constituency to the Northern Ireland Assembly in 1998.
He was Sinn Féin spokesperson on Housing. He was again elected as a councillor for Newry and Mourne District Council from the Crotlieve electoral area in 2005.
